A new entrant into the gaming keyboard ring for the last quarter of 2013 is the ROCCAT Ryos MK Glow mechanical gaming keyboard. Coming in at an initial MSRP of $139.99, the MK Glow is positioned in the middle of the mechanical gaming pack when it comes to price, so they are going to have to kick some serious butt when it comes to features if they want to compete. Personally, I think it's safe to say that once you put a MK Glow on your desk, it will be hard to get it off... Literally! This thing is heavy!

First Look:

Wow wee! That is a big box. The first thing you have to notice about the keyboard when picking it up off the shelf is the size of the box. As I mentioned before, this is a heavy keyboard, and ROCCAT made sure that it wasn't going to jump around in its box, getting a dent or two before it lands on your desk. The packaging is large and rock solid, measuring 34cm x 56 cm x 7cm with lots of thick cardboard and dead space inside. Props for not skimping on the packaging ROCCAT. When unboxing the keyboard, you realize that all that weight you had been feeling wasn't coming from all the packaging, but the keyboard itself. Weighing in at 1578g or 3.48 lbs, this keyboard is going to stay put while you are gaming, even if you end up in a frenzied button mashing rage during a raid.

The design of the keyboard is simple, without a ton of what I call hype buttons. There are no volume knobs, or media player launching buttons to clutter the keyboard up. All of these features are still there, just under function keys of the F1-F12 buttons. Although not immediately apparent at first glance, the caps lock key has been replace with the Easy-Shift[+] key. When using the keyboard as a simple plug and play keyboard without installing the drivers, there is actually no caps lock key.

Flipping the keyboard over reveals channels cut into the keyboard for the USB cable to easily make its way out from under the keyboard in any directing under any circumstances. (I’m looking at you LAN parties).